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| - From the outside, Phu Thanh looks different from any other Vietnamese restaurant in town. It's larger, has a huge presence outside of the typical hidden strip mall, and looks promising.
Rest assured, Phu Thanh is different from most Vietnamese restaurants on the east side... it's very very bad. During a one-hour dinner in their dining room, I noticed three tables that were covered in dirty dishes upon my arrival, and still covered in the same dirty dishes upon my departure. Not to say this ruined my experience, but it sure was disgusting to look at. The waiter service here was actually nicer and more helpful than most, a which is the saving grace here. They offered a refill of my water (rare) and even came back to see if I needed anything else (very rare.) The clientele here seemed like predominately young married couples and young families of non-asian descent.
I had been craving a bowl of Bun all day, a rice noodle dish served with julienned veggies, your choice of meat, and a nuoc mam (fish sauce) to give it a nice flavor. I also ordered spring rolls prior to my meal, and was a tad surprised when, having ordered in Vietnamese, the server asked me questions that made no sense. My order of Goi Cuon garnered a respose of "fried or not fried" which definitely threw me off since fried would be Gha Gio, an entirely different dish... did you ask this because I'm white? He then asked "you need fork right?" No, I just gave you my entire order and said hello in conversational Vietnamese... this wasn't a tip off that I know how to eat your food? The spring rolls were very small and contained little filling. I'm used to Goi Cuon bursting with veggies pork and shrimp, not little tiny thunb sized things. When the Bun came, the noodles were all broken, which made it almost impossible to eat in anything other than tiny bites. The Nuoc Mam had an overwhelming fish sauce smell and flavor and was easily the worst I've ever had, and completely lacked chili, garlic, or anything to mask the fish sauce. Utterly awful. I also felt like the Bun portion was incredibly small compared to other Viet restaurants in town.
I would hesitate to give this place any sort of recommendation, given it's proximity to some of the best Vietnamese restaurants in town. The quality seemed to be on par, and service was somewhat decent, but the combination of small portions, bad tasting food, and lack of ability to clean a table earns this restaurant a solid two-star review. Also, eating Vietnamese more than three times a week, I've had a good run of over two years and haven't become sick from a place. This one has had me burping for the past 12 hours and feeling kind of queasy... nothing major, but definitely something didn't sit well. I'm honstly not sure what the appeal of this restaurant is. Two miles away is Pho Ao Sen, one of the premier spots in the valley.
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